3. Make Each Job Manageable

Consider all the positions your club has and make sure each of them has a reasonable amount of work. A generally acceptable workload is 3 to 6 hours a month. This is in addition to regular club events, such as the monthly meeting, board meeting, public events, and club observing events.

TIP: If any of your members are devoting more than eight hours a month to administrative tasks, to avoid burnout you may want to consider splitting jobs up.

Review the list of roles below. Which ones does your club have? How many of these roles are managed by the same person in your club? If there are members who are wearing more than two or three hats, the Volunteer Coordinator may want to check with them regarding how they are handling the load.

Common Board Positions:

President: Prepares agenda and presides at monthly board and general meetings; Provides support to board members and committee chairs as needed to enable them to fulfill their jobs; Represents the club at club and public events.

Vice-President: Steps in for President in his/her absence; assist President with his/her duties

New Member Steward: Supports new members during their first year of membership, introduces new members to the club, its culture and activities.

Volunteer Coordinator: assures that all club positions are filled and the process to recruit is followed. Recruits for positions as needed.

Outreach Coordinator: Accepts requests from the public and schedules special events, notifies club members of outreach opportunities, gets signups and assures enough members will be present. Cancels and reschedules special events as needed.

Event reporter: writes newsletter/website articles about past and upcoming events, encouraging members to participate in the next one. This could be someone who would write a regular column for your club newsletter on your outreach program.

Event Host: Greets members and visitors at public astronomy events; helps visitors get oriented at the event; has handouts with club information.

Sharing the Universe videos are produced by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP) from research conducted by the Institute for Learning Innovation, the ASP, and from astronomy clubs like yours. www.astrosociety.org/SharingTheUniverse

The Sharing the Universe project is funded by the National
Science Foundation and is supported by the Division of Research on Learning in Formal and Informal Settings (DRL) of the National Science Foundation under Grant Number DRL 0638873. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in the material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.